In episode 20 of Little Busters, Rin tries in her socially awkward way to help a lovesick fellow student gain the attention of his crush, Sasami Sasasegawa. Of course, all attempts fail, and instead, draw him further away from Sasasegawa. Once simply unknown to her, the boy now becomes becomes hated by her.

Art by えすれき

As the episode concludes, Rin instead tells Sasasegawa the truth about her attempts and gives the boy the softball star’s phone number, allowing him to text her. He now has an “in,” and with the truth out there, who knows what will happen? Certainly, the simplicity of the truth led to far better result than Riki’s cockamamie schemes.

Isn’t it strange how we sometimes work really hard when it’s unnecessary?

The beauty of Christianity is in this simple and powerful truth: no matter what we’ve done or who we are, there’s nothing we can do to be redeemed – it is God who sets us free.

The definition of grace is what draws us to the gospel. It’s then ironic that many of us who have experienced grace (or professing Christians who haven’t) add on to the gospel. We must do such and such and so and so to be a “good Christian.” Some will even declare that eternity depends on some of our actions (or inaction), adding to the gospel message. In that way, many in thistime are just as guilty as the Judaizers of Paul’stime, who claimed circumcision and other Jewish traditions had to be carried on by Christians.

We fall from grace when we add to the gospel message. The truth of the gospel is that it gives freedom from sin and freedom from us having to earn our way to salvation. Just as with Sasasegawa, fancy plans are bound for failure. And just the same, the more we skirt around issues and do absurd thing (like add to the gospel message), the more likely we are to miss the point. And in the case of the good news, that would be a very, very bad thing.